obama reached out to speaker boehner and mitch mcconnell today. there's no progress. this is all a p.r. game at this point. >> neil: then republicans have calculated, whatever the risk, it's worth it. >> they have to pick their fights with obama and decided not to pick a fight, at least not yet, on the debt limit. that it will be this summer's battle, and the government shutdown. the government is funded through march 27th. so, republican leaders too not want to shut the government down. so here it's an easy one they can pick a fight because if they do nothing, they get $1.2 trillion in cuts. they don't really have to too anything. it's in the law that president obama himself signed. >> neil: i'm wondering with all the fear tactics, we're going to be eating horse meat and -- mental patients on the street and people will realize, none of this stuff came to pass. none of the end of the world scenarios happened. maybe it could be boy who cried above moment and people will say, wait a minute. >> that's right. that you can cut a significant amount from the budget and nothi